


Winter’s Chill

by foolsomen



Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Bucky has an episode, Established Relationship, He Just deserved some plums, Hurt/Comfort, It doesn’t end well, M/M, Major character death - Freeform, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Post-Captain America: The First Avenger, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Really sad Bucky... like REALLY sad, Sad, damaged Bucky, im sorry for this, kind of, please enjoy, sad bucky, seriously, winter soldier - Freeform, without a lot of comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-26
Updated: 2018-07-26
Packaged: 2019-06-16 19:15:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15443961
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/foolsomen/pseuds/foolsomen
Summary: “It ain’t your fault Buck, it ain’t your fault. I told ya’ I was with ya’ till the end of the line, pal. And I really think this is the end for me, I’m just glad it was you, I love you... till the end of the line.”...In that moment Bucky realized what he had done, who he had killed in a black out.





	Winter’s Chill

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much if you read this story! Please leave kudos if you like it or feedback in the comments, it’d be much appreciated! :)

_“Who are you?”_

 

_”I’m not quite sure anymore,”_

 

...

 

It had been a normal day.

A perfectly normal day. 

The type of day so normal it was almost easy to just forget all the worries of life. To forget that tomorrow would bring new challenges and the day after would bring even more. 

The type of day so perfect that all the stresses of yesterday and times long forgotten were but whispers in the wind, tussling by the wisps of your hair but never moving it so substantially that one would take notice of their movement. 

 

It had been a good day. 

A perfectly normal, good day. 

One almost so rare to Bucky that he had almost forgotten how it felt to have no worries tugging his shoulders to the ground or shaking his hand at the mere mention of his past. 

He had nearly forgotten how it felt to walk with confidence, how it felt to truly feel free once again,  after so long in captivity where such privileges were never given. 

But that day was his one in a million chance to let loose, to relax and allow the anxiety usually weighing on him like bricks, flow down to the ground like water off a petal.  

That was his one day, his one nearly perfect day. The one day he thought would end as flawlessly as it had began, however, he could not have been more wrong.

...

“ _Who do you want to be?”_

 

“ _I’m not sure of that either.”_

...

 

He had not done much of anything in the weeks leading up to that day.

His mind had been surprisingly stable. He hadn’t had an episode in over two months, a remarkable achievement Dr. Banner had said. His vitals had gone back to that of an average human of his appearing age. His arm had been replaced, the wiring secured in a safe, effective way so that he was provided with the upmost protection and security should he ever again have an episode quite like the ones he had been frequenting at the time.

Of course, none of the episodes he had been having had resulted in any deaths, however a few too many people were seriously injured so Dr. Banner and Steve had began treating Bucky in every way possible. Even going as far as to force him to take medication to help with his PTSD, involve therapists to help manage his anger and install a monitoring software within JARVIS (with the help of Stark) to alert one of the Avengers should Bucky ever have any need of them. 

Overall, ever precaution had been taken. Every preliminary measure to avoid such a tragedy had been executed. He had done all of his required mental and physical therapy to aid him in his recovery.

He should not have been able to do it, he had no reasoning, nothing that should have been able to set him off in such a way. He should not have been able to forget everything from his past except his soldier instincts. If only he had remembered one thing, one thought of who James Buchanan Barnes was as a person and it all could have been avoided. He would have been saved. But he wasn’t. He was gone.

...

 

“ _Who were you?”_

 

“ _I was everyone’s worst nightmare.”_

 

...

He had been lounging on the couch in the living room for most of the day when he suddenly decided he wanted to look through old photo albums. He had gotten up and made his way into the bedroom that he shared with Steve, and found the brown leather cover peeking out from a dusty cardboard box sitting in the corner, up against the wall. He then grabbed the book and left the room, returning to his spot on the green, tattered, wool couch he had been sprawled across for the majority of the afternoon. 

He had then flipped through the pages, eyes skimming across photographs of him and Steve, from when they were just young children to when they were fighting together in the war. He had smiled at the pictures fondly, some he had vivid memory of and others he had no hope of ever remembering. Either way, he had always found the most joy in looking at Steve’s smile for him before everything went wrong, before Hydra did what they did, before they made him what they did. Because what they did took away the man Steve loved and left behind a mere shadow of who he once used to be. 

Though Steve had fought with him many a time about it, Bucky never was one to accept that a man as great as Steve could truly love him despite everything he has done and everything he would still do because of how mentally unstable he was. 

Steve was his rock, his ground when the wind picked up, his shelter when tornadoes blew about, his land when he was stranded at sea, his compass when he lost his way and his blanket when the Winter got cold.

Steve was his everything.

His everything.

So when the door opened and his everything changed, that’s when he lost his mind.

...

 

“ _Who were you to him?_ ”

 

“ _I was his- Well... he was My everything. I would like to think that I was his. But at the end of the day, I wasn’t anything more than the man that killed him.”_

 

...

The door had opened. He hadn’t been expecting anyone that day. That’s probably one of the reasons why the soldier part of him had been immediately brought up to the front lines of his brain, fighting for control over his actions. 

Someone was in the house and he didn’t  know who. It wasn’t his fault that he was given no warning, it wasn’t his fault that his condition made it hard for him to have unexpected visitors. It wasn’t his fault that the scenario resulted in him having a panic attack and allowing his other persona to gain full rein over his conscious. 

Bucky, shocked, had fallen into a state of ignorance to his surroundings. Unable to recognize anything or anyone but the nearest weapon and the target, the intruder who became nothing more than just a silhouette with red points of weakness in the soldier’s mind. 

He became the Winter Soldier once again, to protect himself. He succumbed to the cold, darkness of the soldier so he could cope with the shock of someone breaking into his home with intent on harming him. 

He hadn’t thought of any other possibilities.

The person had put up a pretty good fight, they screamed a lot as well but the words were as good as gibberish in the soldier’s mind. Pretty soon, they stopped fighting, they surrendered to the soldier’s relentless punches and accepted their fate. They then began to take their last few breaths and the soldier began to fade away, but not entirely, only enough for Bucky to clearly hear but not see the man whispering,

“It ain’t your fault Buck, it ain’t your fault. I told ya’ I was with ya’ till the end of the line, pal. And I really think this is the end for me, I’m just glad it was you, I love you... till the end of the line.” 

In that moment Bucky realized what he had done, who he had killed in a black out...

Steve.

Captain America.

His best friend.

His husband.

His family.

His Stevie.

...

 

“ _And how does that make you feel?”_

 

“ _Terrible. I killed the man I loved, the only person who’s ever gonna care ‘bout me. And why? ‘Cause I was a stupid, scared, damaged little man to afraid to assess the situation before going all psycho. We were together through thick and thin, Steve and I. We got married for heavens sake, I clearly cared ‘bout him! Since the 20’s even! And all ‘cause I was confused ‘bout who I was, made me all messed up in the head that I couldn’t even function enough to save him!”_

 

...

It usually takes a few days for Bucky’s memory of what happened during an episode to show up. Usually, he’s with Steve when one occurs so he’ll fill him in on what happened. This time, though, it was an impossibility. 

He sat there, staring down at Steve’s limp, lifeless form for what felt like years. His face was beat up pretty badly but he still somehow looked at peace with himself and how he ultimately left this world. Bucky pondered for a while exactly how Steve must have felt when Bucky attacked him, how he really felt at the end, knowing he married his murderer. That realization, in itself, made Bucky feel a whole new wave of guilt for what he had done. 

He wondered where Steve was, if he was in Heaven, if there was such a thing, because if there was, Steve sure as hell would end up there for all the good he’s done in the world. He wondered if Steve saw his ma’ again or if he was still in the room with Bucky in spirit, going to wait until the end of Bucky’s line to go wherever spirits are meant to go. 

He sat and wondered, cried for hours more before someone found him. Returned him to Stark Towers where he was then monitored to make sure he was alright. 

But at that point he no longer cared about how okay he seemed to everyone else, because he knew he would never be okay again. He took the single thing that ever made him okay and killed it. He deserved all the pain coming to him, because he killed the single thing that ever made him happy.

...

 

“ _Who do you really want to be, Mr. Barnes?”_

 

_”I just wanna be the man Steve thought I was. The old me.”_

 

_”I am sorry to be the one to tell you this Mr. Barnes but, in the words of Ashley Bush, you won’t ever be your old self again... you are growing into a new self. A new self that is born out of grief.”_

 

_”What does that mean?”_

 

_”I am afraid that you will never, ever be your old self again. After tragic events like loss of a loved one, we tend to have a suddenly shift in personality and bahavkout, caused by that traumatic event. We just have to adjust to the change and move forward with our lives.”_

 

_”So, I won’t ever be my old self again?”_

 

_”I don’t think the odds are I  your favor Mr. Barnes.”_

 

_”Very well then. I suppose that settles it.”_

 

Bucky stood up from the chair, walked over to the woman and shook her hand. He then left and did not return for his next appointment or for the one after that or for the one after that. In fact, the therapist never actually spoke to Bucky ever again.

 

...

Bucky got transferred to a mental institution three months after the one session he had with his therapist. She stated he was highly unstable, sensitive and incredibly unfit to be living in regular society. 

He spent exactly two weeks, four days in the institution before he was found dead. The cause of death was electrocution after a failed experimental treatment. 

Friends of Bucky mourned him and gave him an honorable funeral for a veteran, he and Steve were buried at the same time, side by side, together. They were offered the opportunity to be buried at Arlington National Cemetery but loved ones turned down the offer and instead laid them to rest in a quiet, reserved grave yard where Steve’s mother was found.

On their grave stone reads “Beloved husbands, friends, soldiers, and icons to all. Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes were best friends and lovers who really were together until the end of the line. May we all remember them as the brave, kind men they were.” 

Their loved ones only hope that they found each other in death as they had in life. 

 

...

*somewhere in the afterlife*

 

“Jerk.” Steve is there. Young as the day he was in the war, before everything went wrong. Before the fall, before the ice, before everything.

 

“Punk.” Bucky is too. Left arm in tact, brain in check, not a scar in sight. His memories are still there, but they hurt less somehow. He feels better than he has in a long while.

 

“Told ya’ I was with ya’ till the end of the line. No need to rush it.” Steve chuckles as he pulls Bucky into a long needed embrace that melts away any pain Bucky had felt up until that point.

 

“I know, I just couldn’t help myself.” They pull away and stare at each other.

 

What would you know? It’s Steve and Bucky in the end after all. Through thick and thin. They made it. Together. Happy but still damaged, healing by the second but together nonetheless. They take pieces of themselves and they aren’t just Steve and Bucky from the twentieth century nor are they just Steve and Bucky from the twenty first century, they just are Steve and Bucky every century moving forward no matter how times change, they will always be together. Punk and Jerk. Steve and Bucky. Captain America and the Winter Soldier. Rogers and Barnes. Reunited with each other and old friends like Peggy Carter and the other Howling Commandos. Together at last, together forever. How it was always meant to be.

 


End file.
